Escape of the Sith
by dashinvaine
Summary: Set just after Return of the Jedi, the protagonist escapes the Imperial defeat at Endor and makes away dreaming of revenge. But will the space pirate crew of the 'Black Star', be an obstacle or an asset in the quest?
1. Chapters 1 to 7

'_Star Wars' is © Lucasfilm Ltd. The characters, worlds and terminology derived from the films belong to George Lucas. However, he seems like a nice bloke and I'm sure he wouldn't mind me using them here in this little 'fan fic'. Especially if I tell you all to go and see '_Star Wars Episode III, Revenge of the Sith_.' It's really good! (And it is too!)_

By Gordon Napier

(Started 30.5.2005)

_A long time ago, in a gallery far, far away..._

**STAR WARS**

**Escape of the Sith**

The fleets of the Galactic Empire and the Rebel Alliance had engaged in battle above the forested moon of Endor. It was a desperately fought battle that would determine the destiny of the universe. It was coming to a dramatic climax…

Chapter 1.

The vast metal sphere exploded in a pulsating ball of flame. The final explosion came from within, the colossal force ripping the artificial world apart. The product of countless months of construction, the military project which had drained the financial resources of many subject worlds, gone in a flash. The second _Death Star_ had never quite realised its full spherical form, nearly a thousand miles in diameter, before disintegrating. It had been designed with the capacity eradicate any planets housing enemies of the Galactic Empire. Instead the colossus died that way itself. And with it how many?

A strange silence, or rather a stillness followed. The two fleets paused amid the battle they were waging, as the blinding flare of the exploding _Death Star_ stunned both rebel and imperial forces into a momentary stupor. Then the fighting began again with renewed fury.

The tie-interceptor's tracking computer picked up the two rebel X-wings on its tail, closing fast. A second later a burst of proton torpedoes hurtled towards the interceptor's octagonal wing. The other X-wing, meanwhile, dived lower so as to have a clear shot at the interceptor's underbelly. It let rip too. There was no chance of the imperial fighter escaping both. The fire concentrated on its position, and soon there was another ball of flame and smoke in the vacuum of space.

'That was mine, red five!' One of X-wing pilots whooped over the com link.

'In your dreams red seven- that was mine!' the other came back.

_Both wrong!_ The interceptor pilot thought, smiling behind the visor of a black helmet. The interceptor dropped out of the decoy smoke cloud it had released, rotating around the axis of spherical mid section, which resembled a great eye between the two vertical wings. Stars span in the infinite distance, beyond the first white rebel craft that came into view through the interceptor's octagonal transpirsteel viewport- the iris of the metal eye. The pilot's black-gloved hand squeezed the trigger on the joystick, and a stream of laser bolts flew from the interceptor's wing-mounted blast cannons. The pilot pulled the joystick around to point the craft at the other x-wing, without waiting for the first target to spin away in flames. _Stop to admire the your destruction_, as they taught all tie and interceptor pilots during basic training, _and you get destroyed yourself_.

The remaining X-wing fighter came into view but now there was another imperial tie fighter, likewise coming into view. It fired, it's lasers burned first into the X-wing's R2 unit, blowing the doomed droid's domed head off into space. A second later one of the tie fighter's photon torpedo's struck home below the X-wing's cockpit, blowing the rebel ship in half.

There was no time for such thoughts, for a moment later another ship had joined the affray, larger but faster than the others. The intercepror pilot signalled an urgent warning

_T-G19, look out behind! Enemy at six o'clock!_

The tie fighter responded, trying to outmanoeuvre the new threat, but soon fell victim to the rebel ship's forward guns, which scored a direct hit to its local ionisation reactor. The interceptor pilot veered again to engage therebel ship- and to avenge the tie fighter it had just consigned to oblivion. The interceptor pilot let off a spray of laser fire just as the gun turret to the fore of the saucer-shaped rebel ship swivelled around towards the imperial fighter, returning fire with equal haste. The interceptor pilot recognised the rebel ship. A few moments before it had shot out of the burning _Death Star_, just in time to escape the searing conflagration it had caused. _I know you_, thought the interceptor pilot. _Millennium Falcon_. At the same time the pilot wrenched the joystick sideways, hoping to evade the _Falcon_'s spluttering laser fire, half knowing that it was already too late.

The antagonists' laser bolts crossed each other in space. An explosion collapsed the gun turret of the _Millennium Falcon_, at the same moment as another destroyed the lower portion of the interceptors starboard wing.

The interceptor was thrown into a wild spin, and it was all the pilot could do to regain stability. The lower of the two triangular sections of the wing, which jutted forward like great blades, had been blasted clean off and now hurtled away from the shop in the opposite direction. A less-skilful pilot would never have escaped so lightly, but still the interceptor pilot muttered stern self-recriminations, while steering the crippled craft away. A glance at the instrument panel revealed an array of screaming warning lights- all telling the pilot that the fighter was finished. The only solace to be had was that the _Millennium Falcon_ had now attracted the attention of a Star Destroyer, and in turn had to divert its attention from the wounded Interceptor. Looking around, though, the interceptor's pilot noticed that several rebel battle cruisers were coming to the _Falcon_'s aid. This was no place for an incapacitated interceptor to loiter. Meanwhile with the loss of the _Death Star_ as well as the Super Star Destroyer, a certain victory had turned into a disaster for the Empire. Soon, doubtless, the remaining Star Destroyers would jump into hyperspace to regroup on the far side of the galaxy, leaving any straggling fighters to the mercy of the rebel fleet.

The interceptor turned awkwardly towards the moon of Endor, putting the battling fleets behind it. Another vessel appeared on the radar, also heading for the moon's shimmering blue atmosphere.

_Vader's shuttle…_The pilot's pulse raced. _Can it be? But something's… wrong…_

The pilot locked on to the tri-winged Imperial shuttle's signal, and followed at a cautious distance, struggling to maintain control of the stricken fighter, aware of the yellow sparks flying from the half-destroyed wing. And then suddenly space was behind. The interceptor plummeted through white clouds, towards green trees. Many miles ahead the shuttle was setting down sedately on a raised landing pad, its wings folding upwards like a naboo swan alighting on a lake. The damaged interceptor, by contrast crashed into the forest, smashing through branches. It's wings crumpled as they hit the ground, but the pilot waited for them to take the impact before jettisoning them, instinctively letting them absorb some of the force first. The craft's bulbous mid section hurtled along on its own like a cannonball, and eventually came to rest half buried in torn up soil, with broken tree trunks and branches stacked up before it like an untidy log pile, and a great gash carved in the land behind it.

The round access hatch above the interceptor blew off and the pilot leapt up onto the top, then, with deft agility launched unto the air, and somersaulted down to the ground. Even clad in the bulky flight suit, with its cumbersome helmet, connected by two tubes to boxy apparatus attached to the front of heavy body armour, the pilot moved with remarkable feline grace.

'Nice landing' the pilot muttered wryly, for no-one else's benefit, swivelling to inspect the hopeless wreckage of the interceptor.

A shower of meteorites fell sparkling on the horizon. The pilot realised that these were fragments of the Death Star, burning up on entry into Endor's atmosphere. Endor was a moon much more fertile and only slightly smaller than Endine, the planet it orbited. It was almost entirely covered with forest, which was not an environment the interceptor pilot was accustomed to.

Dusk would soon be approaching. The pilot looked down to a device attached to the back of one black glove, removing the other glove to press some small buttons thereon. A holographic projection issued from the device, showing the surrounding landscape. A bleeping red marker indicated the pilot's present position, a yellow one the position of Lord Vader's shuttle. The shuttle had landed in the Imperial outpost where the _Death Star_'s shield generator had been installed. For the _Death Star_ to be destroyed, the installation obviously must have fallen to the rebels. The erstwhile interceptor pilot did not like this. Still, remaining here in the woods forever was no option.

After several hours of struggling through undergrowth, across the ever-darkening forests of Endor, the pilot drew near to the installation, skirting the nearby Ewok village, which stretched up into the treetops. Obviously the Imperial fleet had by now withdrawn, conceding victory to the rebels, whose fighters now flew overhead in triumphant formations, while fireworks exploded and music and the sounds of celebration drifted down from the primitive Ewok settlements. _Primitives who helped defeat an empire, _the pilot had to concede, bitterly. Still, if they were having a celebration party already, the rebels must be complacent victors. The Empire was not finished yet.

_Not if I have anything to do with it…_

Through the trees up ahead, flames crackled. The pilot crawled forward, through the cover of foliage, to see what this meant. In a clearing, near the landing pad of the base, below the twisted wreckage of the great aerial that had projected the force shield, there stood a funeral pyre. The pilot let out a gasp.

The golden flames leapt up around the body of Darth Vader, the Lord of the Sith, the Emperor's most formidable disciple. All was lost. The pilot saw the familiar profile of Vader's black mask, which for now seemed to defy the flames. Behind the pyre, a pale young man in black gazedsolemnlyinto the flames.

_Skywalker. The Jedi. The murderer._

The unseen onlooker's hands balled into fists, and then rose to cover the facemask of the black flight helmet, which was an echo of Vader's. The pilot watched until the young man- Luke Skywalk- turned from the pyre, led away by a woman with braids in her hair.

Numb with despair, the young pilot watched the flames until the body was discernable within them no more. At length the pyre collapsed into itself, and flames began to die down. Glowing embers danced away on the breeze. The pilot stepped out from cover and approached the pyre, stooped, and scooped up a handful of ash, letting the ashes cascade between black-gloved fingers.

'You there, don't move!' the voice of a man shouted, breaking the pilot's gloomy reverie. The pilot's head inclined slowly, catching a glimpse of a rebel guard in a peaked helmet and a green camouflaged smock, over a tawny uniform. The rebel was aiming a laser pistol.

'Ok, stand up _slowly_, with your hands up, and turn around,' the rebel called. He came closer. 'It's all over, trooper, best thing to do is give yourself up, and come peacefully.'

The plot looked around, nodded slowly, and obeyed. The rebel approached. 'You'd better come along with me. I'll just take your gun there, then…' keeping his pistol levelled, the rebel reached for the blaster at the pilot's hip, which the pilot allowed him to take. The pilot felt the rebel drop his guard once he had hold of both weapons. Then before the rebelknew what was happening, something had jumped up into his prisoner's gloved hand. There was a sound… _pshewwwwww_… and then a flare of red swept towards the rebel and he was no more.

The pilot smiled darkly inside the helmet. _It seems I'm the rebel now._

…

'Who goes there?' another rebel fighter levelled his weapon. He was stood on guard on the landing platform above the treetops, where Skywalker has landed Vader's shuttle, bearing Vader's body here. The figure approaching him appeareddisarming, dressed in the peaked helmet and camouflage smock of a fellow alliance fighter. He also saw that it was a young woman- a girl, really. When she took off her helmet he recognised that she was a strikingly beautiful one at that. Her black hair was tied back but a few loose locks rippled around a graceful face that smiled at him. In the artificial light around the landing pad he did not notice her extreme pallor, or the strange black-crimson hue both to her dark eyes and her lips. He only saw disarming loveliness, long lashes and a shimmering smile.

'Hello,' she said in a lilting voice. 'Not at the party, comrade?' she asked.

He shrugged, glancing at her shyly. He has not seen her before; perhaps she was newly come from the fleet. 'I have to stay here and guard this shuttle.'

'Oh dear, how tiresome! Well, allow me to relieve you of that.' She produced a metal cylinder, the size of a baton. At her activation a rod of light, white hot with a fiery red outer glow, extended from its end, pulsing and humming. The sentry recognised it as a light sabre, the mysterious weapon of a Jedi… or…

He met her eyes and saw the red gleam. He could not move. Then the burning blade pierced its searing way through his abdomen. He gave an abortive cry.

Two more rebel guards, one male, the other female, appeared in the doorway of the shuttle, at the top of the ramp. They opened fire at the girl with the red light-sabre. She span around, bringing her victim's body into play as a shield, then drew her blaster and fired around him. Two shots and the first of the guards, the man, fell. Then she swept the light-sabre sideways, which cut like a laser beam through the body, causing the man to fall at her feet, cut almost in two. She swung the sabre as she ran up the ramp, deflecting female guard's fire from its blade until within range, and then sweeping it around to take off her head.

The victorious rebels had been using the shuttle to hold three of the imperial stormtroopers captured in the base. The despondent clone troopers, deprived of their blasters and helmets, had been sat in the hold, watched over by another rebel guard. Hearing the noise of fire outside, though, the stormtroopers decided to makea move. The first one rushed on the guard, and fell on him. The guard's laser caught the stormtrooper in the chest at point blank range, and finishing things for him, but the other two came quickly behind. The guard's next shot deflected off one's armoured shoulder plate. The storm trooper wrestled him down, pinninghis weapon arm to the floor, while his brother clone fell on the guard, inflicting blow after blow upon his face until he passed out. Then the young woman appeared around the doorway, deactivating her light sabre, which had done its deadly work- for now. She had cast off the rebel's cloak she had taken from the man who had tried to arrest her by her father's pyre and was wearing the black uniform of an interceptor pilot, with the additional insignia of an imperial officer.

'Good work boys.' She said. 'Now ditch this dead weight and let's try to get a few light-years away from this dump. You- get his weapon first, you- take this one.' She chucked her blaster to the storm trooper on the right.

'Yes captain, thank you captain.'

The storm troopers, happy to be back doing things and taking orders (as was their purpose) drew in the ramp, and tossed the bodies of their erstwhile captor and their erstwhile coleague down from the doorway. Culdara, meanwhile, got the shuttle ready for launch.

She tookthe craft out of Endor's atmosphere, and slipped through the fleet of the rebel alliance before they realised anything amiss. Then she handed the controls over to one of the storm troopers.

'Where to now captain?' he asked.

She seemed not to hear, gazing with melancholy eyes into the eternal night of space. It hardly seemed to matter. Her wistful expression, even something about her features, though she did not realise it, echoed the look she has seen on Skywalker's face as he had looked down on Vader's burning body. Both the Emperor and Vader were dead. 'We are all orphans now,' Culdara said to herself in a low voice.

'Ma'am?'

'What?'

'What co-ordinates should I plot?'

'Anything… Anywhere. Out of the quadrant. Stay alert for rebel alliance ships, and listen out for Imperial signals too.'

She rose and left the cockpit for the mid section. She needed solitude, she needed darkness. It was time to listen to the voice of the force. It was time to find out if she was truly alone, or if anything else remained of the Sith.

Chapter II.

The sun set through a haze of brown, green orange and gold streaks with a beauty that belied the noxious pollution that hung in the air over Sopas. Sopas, under the auspices of the galactic empire, had become the largest industrial city on the colonized world of Colle. There was something else in the air tonight, though, and it was freedom. The population, a mixture mostly of humans and reptilian sarpans had turned out to watch imperial garrison depart. The Emperor's officers and storm troopers had kept the population subjugated since the invasion twenty years previously, but now they had been recalled to the capital world. The Empire has been shaken to the core by the rebel alliance's victory at Endor, and now the Colle garrison was needed to reinforce the imperial forces struggling to resist a popular rebellion on Coruscant. In walkers, on speeders and hover-pods, or else marching in columns of thousands, the troops passed onto the vast transport ships. One by one the transports launched into the discoloured sky, which would be the Empire's legacy.

The people lining the way, once it became clear that the occupying troops were really going, and were unlikely to return any time soon, shouted and jeered, while some danced and sang suppressed patriotic songs celebrating their new freedom. Some even dared to pelt the departing forces with various unpleasant projectiles. In one place Imperial hoverers had to fire on the people to cover the retreat of the troops.

A bunch of men ran into a tavern off the main street, with the noise of the commotion in the background. They thumped on the bar.

'Drinks! Let us celebrate! No more slaving for the empire! No more bloody storm troopers!'

'This is a day to remember! Come on landlord, drinks!'

'The Empire is leaving!'

The sarpan bar tender muttered something in its own language.

'What did he say?'

'He said aye, and with it some ofhis best customers.'

'Bloody sarpan collaborators! I'm not paying for drinks off this bloody lizard!' One of the men clambered over the bar, pushing the sarpan out of the way, grabbing a glass and pressing it to the tap.

'Get off that, get out you thieving mammal!' The sarpan barman wrenched him away from the tap and the glass smashed on the floor. The man turned red and aimed a punch at the sarpan, which the sarpan dodged, allowing the man's fist to smash into a bottle of imported Romulan ale. His hand came back bloody from the broken glass. 'Right…'

Some more sarpans turned up, and soon the situation developed into a full-on brawl, with the sarpans gang siding against the humans. Pretty soon the fight escalated to fill the bar, involving stools and broken bottles with the clientele joining in on one side or the other. A sarpan punched a number of teeth out of one of the men, who stumbled back against a metal chair, which he picked up, in turn, and hurled back at the sarpan. The sarpan deflected it with his tail and it flew into an unfortunate Vespani barmaid, who dropped the four trays of glasses she was carrying, and fell into the lap of one of the few men who had not yet deigned to get involved. He fished the tip of her right antennae from his tankard of alien rum and helped her to her feet. 'Easy there, my lass!' Next he tapped the sarpan on the shoulder, 'and you, watch what you're doing, clumsy lizard fool!' The man was sinewy and stocky, with a black band around a tanned shaven head. Looking him up and down the sarpan notices the blaster pistol and, unusually, the light sabre at his belt. The sarpan then glanced to the table where the human's two companions sat, both were hooded but the sarpan felt them looking back from the gloom of their corner. From the hood of one extended seven tentacles that waved menacingly. From the cloak of the other hooded individual reached the arm of a solidly built droid, which was carving a crude skull deeply into the tabletop with a formidable knife held in a powerful metal fist.

…

A junior imperial officer marched up with some trepidation to the old Admiral, and saluted crisply.

'Admiral Tiberg, Sir. I can report that the operation egress is ninety percent complete. The last Imperial personnel will have left planet Colle within the next hour- two at the most.'

'You see, gentlemen, we are orderly in all things,' the Admiral said to his group. He glanced back at the young officer, and waved his hand dismissively. 'Good Good, mister Ramone. Carry on.' Tiberg, who had for the past six years exalted in the position of Governor General of Colle, now paced aboard his enormous star destroyer, high above the planet, followed at a respectful distance by his lackeys. His tall black boots echoed on the metal cargo deck. He wore a crisp, sombre grey uniform, and a serious frown. The frown was his perennial expression. No less was expected of a man so important. In truth, however, he felt mildly satisfied. He may be presiding over a withdrawal, but he would not be leaving empty handed. He tapped a cane into his black-gloved hand, and returned his attention to what really interested him.

'Open this one' He pointed to one of the countless containers with his cane. Two storm troopers rushed to obey, and soon revealed the tall golden statue packed inside the container, which gleamed in the ship's harsh electric lighting.

'Who is this one?' Tiberg asked an attendant, who had overseen the stashing aboard of this piece, as a tiny part of a vast horde- a mountain of treasure, in fact. Gold, silver, jewels, antiquities, art, money… the plundered riches of a whole world.

'It is the Emperor Irlik Vill, very fine workmanship, Admiral!' the attendant said. '3,400 years old, I believe. Note the particularly exquisite craftsmanship on the features, the regalia…'

'Yes, yes. Emperor, eh? Hah! To think there was a time when the rule of only half a planet considered himself an emperor!'

'Yes sir, to think.'

The Admiral's lips twitched; there was almost a smile for a moment. 'Fortunate that we are able to salvage something of Colle's culturefor posterity.' He looked about his retinue, each of whom nodded knowingly. Tiberg was making off with all the valuables his vast ship could carry from the soon to be abandoned colony. When the evacuation of his troops was complete, he would finish things by ordering his Star Destroyer to open fire on the cities of Colle. That would teach those wretches to rejoice at the departure of their masters.

….

'Krilon!' a man called through the affray in the bar. 'Mort-nine! Atobink! Come on you old ruffians! We've gotta go!'

The heavy-set bald man with the light sabre and pistol made to move past the sarpan.

'Just a minute mister,' the sarpan said, 'you were talking to me… and here's what I have to say in reply…' The sarpan drew his bony fist back and sent it flying towards the man's face. The man, though, ducked. The sarpan, instead, felt his wrist caught in the steel grip of the droid, who had stood up and now towered almost as high as the ceiling. The droid lifted the sarpan off his feet, and promptly caught hold of the twitching tail. With its feet staying locked where they were, the droid rotated at the middle, swinging the sarpan round and into the wall, so that it's skull smashed into the plasterwork. The droid then swung back quickly the other way, releasing the sarpan and sending it flying into the crowd- it's fall cushioned by the bodies of several people who fell under it's weight. A silence fell as people looked around at the formidable droid.

'Nice work, Atobite, but I could've handled him!' Hake Krilon said in is gravely voice, tapping his companion's metal arm. The hulking droid looked down at him, with its one red eye. The hood of it's cloak had slipped down, revealing the great, crudely bolted and welded scar across it's metal face, obliterating it's left eye sockets, and the seared skull symbol at it's brow.

The man who had called to them, meanwhile hurried up. He was a young and good-looking human with sandy hair and a short-trimmed goatee beard. Noticing the exotic vespani bar maid, he raised an eyebrow and flashed a smile at her, but then seemed to remember a sense of urgency, and looked back to the odd trio 'Come on, men, we've got to get out of here!'

'What's the hurry Drake?' Krilon demanded.

'I've found out something. Something rather worrying actually, I'll tell you on the way back to the mother ship. Just trust me, we've got to go!'

Chapter 3.

Culdara lay in the darkened cabin on the shuttle, only now realizing that this had been Lord Vader's vessel, and that this had probably been his cabin. It was very quiet, but in her mind she could still hear the absent sound… The sound of him, the mechanical breathing. In others that sound had invariably inspired fear- the knowledge that behind mask had lain a darker force that could have destroyed them with a thought. But she had never feared it- not that way. For her it had always been a fear that had thrilled her, it was a fear that she missed. She would have given anything to have back that beloved fear. It was better than this present fear, this emptiness, this uncertainty.

Her father had never let her look upon his face without the mask, much to her regret, and now she would never see him. She was alone, she was lost. Culdara wiped her eyes, which in the darkness had a soft red glow. What would her father have thought if he could have seen her behaving like such a weak creature? It was not the example he had set her… and yet she knew that grief had once done something similar to him, too. Once he had told her of it, soon after her mother's death. She now thought he had meant her to take it as a warning…

It had not been Culdara's mother, alas, who had broken Vader's heart, but the one who came before. Padme. Padme's death had co-insided with Vader becoming Vader. The Emperor's work constructing the mechanical shell to sustain the living vestiges of his apprentice had almost been in vain. The first thing Vader had learned after his resurrection within was that Padme was no more. The news had crushed him, plunged him into an abyss of grief and guilt. It had robbed him of any will to go on living, let alone to assist his master in the consolidation of the new cosmic order.

Culdara had sensed the pain and sorrow in him when he had spoken of those days. She had known that no one besides her mother had been party to the truth of it. Vader had been paralysed with despair, trapped in the apparatus that sustained his new nightmarish existence. His body and mind had rejected the inhuman shell, the artificial substitutes for limbs and lungs, flesh and nerves. He had shrank from ending it all, back then, only because of the fear- no- the _certainty_ that something worse awaited him. After the monstrous things thathe had done he stood little chance of being granted the mercy of oblivion, let alone the blessing of reunion of his lost bride Padme. The Force would have seen to that…

The main reason Vader had told Culdara all this, perhaps,was so that she would know what he hadowed to her mother. Ondana had never been a replacement for Padme. The man who had loved Padme (who had gone by another name which Vader never spoke) had been long dead by then. A haunted shadow alone remained. The heart that had loved her had been twisted by the dark side. Yet it had remained the heart of a young man, with a young man's yearnings, and enough remaining, anatomically, to carry them through…

Ondana had been something to him though. She had brought him some solace, and some satisfaction. The Emperor had been instrumental in finding her for Vader, as the means to restore his protégé's vitality. The Emperor had noticed the young woman, employed in some minor administrative capacity on an Imperial outpost. She was half human, half Chiss, which gave her a blue tint to her flesh and eyes like setting suns. She had been beautiful, her features sufficiently reminiscent of Padme's to appeal to Vader, while being different enough not to remind him too much of his agonizing loss each time he looked at her.

The Emperor had summoned Ondana, and had discerned in her heart just what he was looking for: a sweetness, a generosity, a streak of passive perversity... Furthermore there had been within her a sense of alienation, which aptly reflected that which had clearly plagued Vader since his reconstitution. Ondana had been a lost soul, adrift in life. Admittedly Vader had been at first a being of terror to her, before whom she always trembled. However, her quest to ease his pain, and her growing devotion to him had brought meaning to her life. So the Emperor's match making had worked, eventually, and the birth of Vader and Ondana's daughter, three years later, had only strengthened their private bond. The Empire, though few new about it, had reason to thank Ondana.

Ondana had born Vader's child on Coruscant. Culdara had grown up devoted to her mother, and knowing her father as a towering, faceless spectre with rasping breathing, which ultimately became for her almost comforting. This figure's visits had been intermittent and secretive.Vader had sensed in his daughter great potential powers. His first lesson for her had been howto conceal these. He had taken the small girl in his arms and held her close to his masked face. That rich, low voice had told her about the Emperor whom she was to love and serve, like all other good subjects of the Empire, but from whom she was to keep a distance. Many times since, he had repeated it… 'I am your father, Culdara, and I will teach you many great things but you must never let this be known. You must be mindful to control your thoughts, my child.'

From an early age he had taught her about the Force, and howone might harness its power. The Force was strong with her- it flowed the blood. She had learned to be cautious- not to runnoticably faster than her friends, though she could, or to let them see, in childhood games and rough-and-tumble, the ease which she could anticipate their movements. She was to save it for the privacy of his lessons. The secrecy had been hard work sometimes, but Culdara had also enjoyed having her secret- the thing that made her special. Her father's presence had been more like that of an elemental force than of a mere man. His voice had held the irresistible power and authority of a god. His insight into the ways of the Force had been awesome. He had been a demanding preceptor but she had been an eager pupil- anxious to avoid his displeasure, and forever craving the slightest indication that hemight beproud of her. When, at about the age of seven, her father had shown her a light sabre for the first time, and told her about the prestige of the weapon, the sense of wonder and privilege had had almost overwhelmed her. These lessons and this time with Vader had been a dreamlike secret life for her, which she never spoke about to her friends or even her mother (who, as Culdaralater realized, had been keeping secrets of her own).

Culdars's quick-wittedness had made her a likely pilot, and in her early teens she had joined the Imperial Military Academy. She had scarcely begun her training as an imperial pilot when she heard the whispers passing around among her fellow cadets that the Death Star, the original one, the rumoured battle station which they had all been exchanging fantastical stories about, had been blown up by the Rebel Alliance.

Already Culdara had known… Vader had met his daughter shortly after, to tell her what she had already sensed. Ondana had been aboard it. Across the boundless space, Culdara had felt it the moment her mother died. Long before, Vader had told her about the dark side, about grief and anger and hatred. Only then, though, did she come to truly understand. She had found a source of energy in her pain, and in her new, burning hatred of the rebels (and also of something called a Jedi). She had felt she should have been there to protect her mother. She had felt a deep desire to avenge her.

Now the same people had taken her father, too… and before she had even had the chance to prove herself to him. But in the interim time Vader had taught her much more. She had built her own light sabre. Taught by the most excellent, she had developed formidable skills with the weapon, and dreamt of one-day crossing blades with a Jedi. She had also begun to countenance yielding to the dark side; for only it could deliver the means take her revenge.

She could not escape the conclusion that her duty now was to avenge Darth Vader, too, and to continue his work. She must do it, even if it meant embracing more of the dark side than she had ever dared to before. Even if it meant losing herself to the darkness.

Chapter 4.

The battle-scarred star cruiser _Black Star_ floated in space off Colle, at the edge ofan asteroid belt, just out of sensor range of the Imperial Star Destroyer and the fleet of lesser war craft and troop transporters. Its docking bay was the destination of the two speedy, two-man fighter/reconnaissance gunships, which had come from the planet, as directly as possibly without running into the imperial vessels. The two round-winged fighters glided in through the wide triangular portal, and set down in bays flanked by myriad similar craft. Crewmen and technicians came to give the fighters the once-over, and to welcome the four colleagues back aboard.

'Treasure you say?' Captain Audron looked at the four members of his crew, who had returned with important information, and who now stood before his desk in his private cabin. He registered their forms with the aid of the electronic implants that had taken the place of his eyesforthe last ten years, since his capture and torture by a rival pirate chief. If his eyes had still been in situ, they would have been filled with a mixture of incredulity and greed.

'Yes Captain,' Drake Orbit nodded, with a suitably piratical twinkle in his eye. 'According to my trusted source, Admiral Tiberg has filled his ship with all the treasure he could plunder from Colle. He's probably been gathering it for years. He's had so much gold stacked aboard, now, it's a wonder that Star Destroyer of his doesn't crash out of space! Treasure, sir, more treasure than you can imagine!'

'My boy, are you honestly suggesting that we try to board an Imperial Star Destroyer? You want us to attack the Empire? Are you quite mad?'

Drake leant forward. 'All I know, sir, is that there is a treasure ship like no other, really close by, and that we are supposed to be corsairs! And you are supposed to be our fearless leader.'

'Easy, Drake.' Krilon tapped the younger man's shoulder. 'Sorry Cap'n Audron, Master Orbit is young and impetuous.' He fixed a sharp look on Drake, telling him not to forget his place. But the he looked back at Captain Audron. 'Of course, he could be right, sir. A captain who took such a treasure could be like an emperor himself. Another chance like this one will never come, and there isn't much time. Soon that ship'll be gone.'

The captain tugged at his ragged beard. He wore worn old clothes and had an unkempt looks that belied his power and authority. He had amassed a private fortune from his decades of privateering already. He had made his reputation, in former years, by many deeds of daring. Since his escape from his enemies he had been avenged on them all, and become the menace of the quadrant. So there was no need for him to get involved in this hair-brained strike against the Empire itself.

The young man before him seemed to read his thoughts. 'Captain, I heard you were a great pirate. That's why I joined this ship. Can you really have grown so old and frightened that you would pass up a chance like this?'

'Still your tongue, boy, we know what you think.' The captain stood up. He looked at the Septipoid crewman. 'What about you, Atobink, you're very quiet, what do you think?'

The beak-like mouth amid the Septipoid's tentacles made a clicking sound. 'Captain, I'm not afraid to attack them, but I have to ask, what if this is a trap?'

Captain Audron laughed. 'I don't know if we'reimportant enough to the Empire for them to bother setting traps for us. If we get away with this, we soon will be! If we don't, and all die, we can blame young master Orbit here!' The captain looked at Orbit, the twitch of his bushy moustache hinting at a smile somewhere below, and then at he turned to Krilon. 'Go, Commander, take the bridge, get the crew standing by, and have the fighters readied for launch. I will join you soon. Go now, all of you, to your stations.'

The delay was necessary, for among others, Audron had to contact Lord Prah, over a secure channel. Prah was a Falleen, an elegant reptilian humanoid, and one of the most powerful business magnates in the galaxy. He had a long face, a green complexion, and black hair worn tied back in two bands, one towards the back, on the top of his head, one at the back of his neck. As most outlaws knew, but never openly acknowledged, Prah was also the overlord of the Black Sun crime syndicate, whose influence permeated the empire and beyond. He had consolidated his place as his cousin Prince Xisor's successor. No pirate or brigand did anything too significant before consulting the Black Sun- and agreeing to share the profits. Under Prah, the Black Sun and the Empire has come to an accommodation. For a couple of years a tacittruce had been in place between the two powers. The empire had turned a blind eye to the criminal dealings of the syndicate so long as the Black Sun prayed mainly on worlds beyond the Empire, or better still made trouble for the rebels. Now, though, the situation had changed somewhat.

Prah's hologram flickered into view, and fixed a steely eye on Captain Audron. 'You wished to speak to me, my dear Captain?'

Audron bowed, and explained his plan.

Prah's holographic features registered some alarm. 'You seek to bring Imperial reprisals down on us all?'

'My Lord, I'm sure you are better informed on the situation with the Empire than I. But surely if the Empire is withdrawing from a key industrial colony like Colle, then it must be on its last legs. We have heard of a defeat at Endor and an uprising on Coruscant...'

'Ah yes, that is true. There is a degree of… high spiritedness here.'

'The population's risen up, we hear, in the name of the New Republic.'

'Indeed.'

'Are… you… supporting this?'

'Shall we say, at this stage, we are not stopping it. The Empire is in crisis, and nearly bankrupt, largely thanks to its Death Star obsession.'

'You seem to agree that the Empire is dying, and not worth supporting. The vultures will soon be circling- why not seize the honour of being the first of them? Of course we would share the glory and the booty with your organisation.'

'Of course. You may proceed, but be warned, you do so at your own risk.'

'Thank you, Lord Prah.'

'One more thing, Captain Audron. If your little venture fails… we do not know each other, you and I, and never had this conversation.' At that the reptile lord's image disappeared.

…..

'Have you seen that new D1 Tie-Defender?' One of the two stormtroopers was saying to the other, in the cockpit of the shuttle that zoomed away from Endor.

'No,' said the other.

'It's supposed to be pretty neat…'

Culdara entered the cockpit, glancing out at the stars ahead of them, all moving in the infinite expanse of space. The starlight, the beauty out there, had a calming effect on her, to some extent; though she also knew that the universe out there was much less peaceful than it looked.

She could not believe she had caught herself crying, before. Some Sith she was turning out to be! Still, it was a daughter's duty to mourn her father. She was getting over her initial upset, and she now felt more drowsy than anything else. Even her anger had subsided, and sunk back into its dark and bitter place in her core from which it would surely later resurface and demand to be satiated, to be bought-off with the blood sacrifice that would be her ultimate vengeance. But that would be in the future…

She leant against the side of the empty chair behind the two pilots. Her eyes now had a distant, dreamy look. She had let her long hair down and taken off her stuffy interceptor pilot's uniform. She was dressed now only in her black undergarments- skimpy briefs and an unadorned but perfectly fitted bra. Her body was lean and beautiful. Her smooth skin seemed to have a silver glow. The only reminder of her other nature was the synthetic leather belt strapped around her hips, bearing her laser pistol and light sabre. It made a piquant contrast to her youthfully feminine form.

It was not every day that something made a stormtrooper do a double-take. Culdara covered a slight smile, amused and mildly flattered, despite herself.

'Plot a course for the planet Colle,' she said. She had been weighing their options. Admiral Tiberg, she knew, commanded the nearest Imperial colony of any size, though it was still some way away. He would know the latest news regarding the security of the Empire. If there was to be a leadership struggle, Tiberg would probably be one of the contenders. He seemed the most likely ally in the immediate term, despite his rumoured corruption.Probably a stronger candidate for the Emperor's successor was Grand Admiral Thrawn, who was not only one of the most influential officers in the Imperial fleet but one of the few non-humans. He was a full-blooded Chiss, of the blue-skinned race with luminous red eyes, and he was a distant relation of Culdara's late mother. Thrawn's ruthless and efficient reputation, though, and the military glory he had won in the past, made him the epitome of an Imperial patrician. Perhaps in time Culdara would end up joining Grand Admiral Thrawn's faction. Even so it would not hurt in the meantime to find out about Thrawn's potential rival Admiral Tyberg. She might even learn something useful.

'Yes ma'am. Colle, sector 345-15-9.' The second stormtrooper said.

'It will take us a while to reach the planet.' Culdara said, covering a little yawn. 'I'm going to get some sleep. You two, once you have finished plotting the co-ordinates, may rest, too- if you stormtroopers ever _do_ rest. If you do, though, you had better take it in shifts.'

'Thank you, ma'am.' Said the second stormtrooper, glancing around. 'If I may say so, ma'am, by the way, your hair looks nice down.'

Culdara raised an eyebrow. Clone troopers were supposedly genetically engineered to have their minds on the military task in hand, not to take notice of women's hairstyles.

'Sorry ma'am, I spoke out of turn.' The stormtrooper looked down at the instrument panel, and concentrated on looking busy.

'Not at all.' Culdara said softly, wondering if there was a blush behind the stormtrooper's helmet. 'Goodnight boys. Wake me if anything happens.'

The door slid closed behind her, leaving only a trace of her sweet scent.

'You fancy her!' The first stormtrooper ribbed his comrade thumping out at him.

'Shut up!' said the second, thumping him back.

….

Admiral Tyberg stood on the bridge of the Star Destroyer _Punisher_. He looked out of the window array, at the planet Colle. Some regions looked relatively untouched from this height, while others were covered with the industrial cities the Empire had built, which were big enough to be visible from space.

'That's enough time. Target the city of Sapos first. Concentrate fire on the industrial regions, and the chemical plants in districts 59 and 60. They should burn well.'

'Targeting Sapos.' The gunnery officer confirmed.

'Sir, sensors are picking up an approaching craft, from the asteroid belt…'

'What?'

Tyberg crossed to the monitor screen. The image came up of a battle cruiser, formed like a series of segments. It bristled with weaponry, including two double cannon on the bow. Eight great doors opened down each side of the craft in its sides and great arms extended, each with seven star fighters fixed to it byamagnetic connection. The extended limbs added to the insect-like appearance of the cruiser. They looked like the legs of a millipede.

'Rebels?' the sensor officer voiced.

'Space pirates.' The admiral sneered. 'What fools!'

'Sir,' the gunner said, 'should I proceed with the targeting of Sapos?'

'No, we can deal with these outlaws first.' He clicked his fingers towards the chief navigation officer. 'Bring the ship about. We will engage the enemy. This shouldn't take very long.'

….

'There she is' the navigator of the _Black Star _said. Sure enough, the Star Destroyer, _ISS Punisher_, loomed into view, turning to face them like a spearhead in space.

'Beautiful!' Krilon said, in a low voice. He stared out at the formidable craft, and balled a fist. 'Yes, come on! Come to daddy!'

'Captain Audron entered. 'I have the bridge.' He tapped Kilon's shoulder as his old comrade vacated the captain's chair. 'Get to your fighter, Hake; don't keep that big ugly droid of yours waiting. Good luck, you damned scoundrel!'

'I'll see you later, sir,' Krilon said. 'When we are all kings!'

'You alright Mortie?' Krilon glanced back at his giant metal gunner, as he slid down into the confined cockpit of his star fighter. Mort-nine's one eye throbbed yellow and red. He was happy enough. There would soon be some killing. Krilon looked along the line of fighters, and picked up his intercom. 'Ok, Skull and Blood Squadrons, power up, me hearties, and get ready for glory! Bridge, stand by to RCF!'

The rocket engines of the fighter craft flared into life. Crewmen on the bridge flicked switches and pulled levers reversing the current of the electric coils built into the arms holding the fighters, and neutralizing the magnetic bonds. The arms retracted back into the body of the _Black Star_, and the fighters flew into two battle formations on either side of the mother ship. _Punisher_, meanwhile launched it's own tie fighters, which burst from it's hull like a swarm of gnats.

Chapter 5

The fighters were the first to engage each other, joining battle in a speedy and furious melee. Each of he Imperial Tie-fighters, on the approach, resembled a great letter 'H', with a spherical cockpit suspended between two solar-panel covered wings, which were revealed as hexagonal as they passed. There was no time to count the imperial fighters, but it was immediately clear to the pirate pilots were many more of them, perhaps five times as many.

'It's our lucky day, Blood Squadron! I've never seen such a target-rich environment!' Drake Orbit said over his comlink. Atobink, his gunner and co-pilot, clicked wryly behind him.

The pirate gunship-fighters were larger than the tie-fighters. They were equally fast on the straight, though less manoeuvrable. They boasted superior armour which would limit the damage tie-fighter laser fire could inflict, even if the defensive force-shields failed. By contrast the tie fighters were relatively flimsy, and not even equipped with shields. (The Empire was used to winning through weight of numbers. It had developed a complacent tendency to view its tie fighters and their pilots as expendable). The pirate craft also had superior firepower, including not only the fixed wing mounted laser blasters and plasma torpedoes controlled by the pilot but also a powerful turret- mounted photon canon above, controlled by the movements of the co-pilot/gunner inside, who had a view of the battle and the targets on offer on a screen positioned before his face, fixed to the bubble-like rotatable unit in which the gunner sat. The weaponry sensor would show when the canon was locked on its target, and the programming could keep the canon locked on irrespective of the movements of the ship. The tie-fighters, by contrast, had to be pointed at their targets. They could only hunt one quarry at a time and could not protect their own behinds.

'Skull squadron, with me,' came Krilon's voice over the com system. 'Draw the tie-fighters away from that Star Destroyer.'

Drake, meanwhile signalled his own group 'Blood squadron with me! Fight your way through to those troop ships, lets see if we can persuade them to leave!'

And so the fighters clashed, and the fire flew. The tie fighters attacked in co-ordinatedswarms, but the larger gunships blasted their way through. Meanwhile the _Black Star_ took on the _ISS Punisher_ itself. The gun batteries of great ships began to pound one another with photon fire.

After a while, the image of one of the captains of the troop ship flickered into life on the secondary screen on the bridge of the _Punisher_. 'Admiral, _ITS Atlas_ is coming under sustained attack…' an explosion sounded behind, along with the shouts and commotion, '…attack from the enemy fighters. Our defences are inadequate, sir, our cannons are not getting through their shields. Can you come to our aid?'

'Where are our fighters?'

'Half seem to have been drawn away; the rest can't defend themselves and us. Sir, we need your help!'

'Negative, Captain, we are presently busy with the pirate mother-ship.'

'In that case, sir, request permission to jump into hyperspace, with the rest of the fleet, and make for Coruscant, while we still can.'

'Affirmative.' The admiral told a communications operator to open up channels to the rest of the ships. 'All troop ship captains, initiate hyperspace jump protocols. We will join you when we have eliminated the enemy battle cruiser.'

The _Black Star_ was rocked by the bombardment from the _Punisher_, but it was holding its own, and giving as much as it got.

'_Black Star_, this is Blood Squadron Leader,' came Drake Orbit's voice over the com. 'It's working, Captain, the other imperial ships are scampering into hyperspace. Still quite a few pesky tie-fighters trying to kill us out here though!'

'This is the life, eh lad?' Captain Aurdon grinned. 'Grand show! Clear up as many as you can then get back here!'

At that a great blast from a gun port just below the 'T' shaped bridge section of the star destroyer, which towered over the triangular hull, caught the _Black Star_ in a critical position, and the pirate ship's energy shields gave way. Another direct hit and an explosion ripped right through the Black Star's midsection.

Audron stood up, clutching his chair for support, as his ship reeled under him. He laughed. 'That took a while! Status, please, Boatswain Dafarj.'

Dafarj looked up from his instruments 'Extensive damage, and raging fires on three decks in the midships, sir. Total power failure aft of the armoury. Two fighter bays on the starboard side are flooding with flame…' A sudden flash of sparks nearly blew Dafarj back off his chair. '…Oh, and the damageanalysis machine just blew up!'

Audron saluted in the direction of the looming form of the Imperial Star Destroyer. 'Nice gunnery Admiral!' he shouted across at his opponent, with a manic laugh. He switched to the _Black Star's_ internal com link. 'All hands to the forward section, if you please… Navigator, power up the forward auxiliary engine, and prepare to initiate separation!'

Meanwhile out in space the dogfight continued. Laser fire tore past the lead pirate gunship. A section of panel flew off its wing after one minor hit. 'Look out in front, Atobink!' Drake called, 'Here come a whole cluster of Ties, out to kill my mother's little boy! And yours's little… tadpole or whatever!'

'Egg, actually.' Atobink span around in his capsule, and the canon above swung around in synch. It picked off the enemy fighters, clearing a path, through which the distant, bladelike form of the _Punisher_ could be seen, silhouetted against the surface of Colle. 'Oh, right, cracking!' Drake said. 'Nice shooting by the way!'

The _Punisher_ was by far the superior of the two capital ships, and it was inevitable that it would gain the upper hand. Eventually the _Black Star_ was reduced to a flaming hulk. Most of its superstructure and the majority of its gun turrets had been pulverised, and it already resembled a space wreck. Admiral Tiberg watched with satisfaction as it turned its back on his ship, as though trying to limp away from the brutal engagement. 'The fools are finished now! After them!'

The burning bulk of the _Black Star_'s rear section hid the front section from view as it uncoupled, and dropped below the wreckage of the rear.

'Initiate tractor beam! All forward weapon batteries- lock on target and fire!' Tiberg roared. A second later the _Black Star_ erupted, as the fire concentrated on its main reactor core. Wreckage flew out of the explosion in all directions. There were several thuds as some of these hit the massivehull of the _Punisher_.

'I think that's that.' Tiberg said, frowning his least dissatisfied frown. 'Now, let us polish off the rest of their fighters. Then we can get on with flattening Colle.'

Undetected by the great Star Destroyer's sensors, the forward section of the Black Star clamped itself like a barnacle to the underside of the Star Destroyer's hull. Audron had always suspected that it would be necessary to sacrifice the main part of his own ship in order to make a bid for this prize. Looking around at the rough-and ready assortment that constituted his crew, massed around the bridge, the captain saw that each appreciated the audacity of what they were about to attempt. No pirate had ever dared take on an Imperial Star Destroyer before, much less try to capture one. He had with him about two hundred hardened pirates. Soon a pair of laser cutters would cut a way in through the formidable hull of the Star Destroyer, beneath an access hatch on theunderside of the _Black Sun_. The space between the two hulls had first been made airtight by a great ring, which had extended around the _Black Sun_'s escape hatch, and pressure sealed to the _Punisher_.

Two hundred pirates, however armed to the teeth and motivated by the smell of treasure, was not much with which to capture a Star Destroyer, and its crew of several thousand. However, Audron knew that if he could achieve his first objective and capture the cargo hold and the docking bay then the way would be clear for the pirate fighter-gunships to come aboard, then their pilots could bolster up the numbers. That would also prevent the Admiral whisking his treasure away before it could be seized.

The intruder warning alarmwas soon sounded, and soon the pirate boarders were fighting a running battle against divisions of stormtroopers, whom the Admiral scrambled to the defence of his ship. The pirates charged at them, though, not only with blasters and laser rifles, but also with bladed weapons- daggers, swords and cutlasses in their other hands (timelessly effective. Eachpirate tookthe toll on the enemy that two or three ordinary insurgents might have.

'Admiral, we cannot cope here, we must fall back!' Lieutenant Ramone, the young Imperial officer leading the hard-pressed stormtroopers called into his com.

'Negative. Hold your position.' The cold order came back.

'It's impossible! We must fall back!' Ramone glanced behind. 'Come on, regroup in the storage section!' he called to his men. They fought their way back down a corridor, only to have their retreat cut off by a heavy, armoured door descending, creating a dead end and an airtight seal. Three more such doors slammed down, one in the midst of the pirate horde, one behind them and another sealing off a side route. It seemed to be the end of the road for both the Star Destroyer's borders and its defenders...

…..

Culdara stood alone, yet not alone, before a scene familiar yet different. Ahead of her was what she has seen on Endor, Lord Vader laid out amid the flames of his funeral pyre. But around was not the forests of that moon, but a desolate vale, strewn with rocks and surrounded by high, craggy mountains, rising up to jagged peaks, dark against a writhing, bloodwashed sky. The flames of the pyre rose up before her, a howling wind seemed to draw them high and scatter them about the air. The firelight cast flickering shadows from the rocks all around. Culdara sensed things in those shadows, dark, ancient beings, and heard eerie, mysterious whispers, like chanting, in the spaces between the sighs and howls of the wind. She felt herself watched by many lost souls, those that haunted this nightmare world. She looked around briefly, and withered faces shrank into the shadows. She turned back to the pyre. Now she saw a vague figure beyond the flames, in a dark, hooded robe. The figure reached out an arm…

_Pshhhhewwww_

A green light flared. The figure raised its pulsing light sabre.

'Jedi!' Culdara breathed, feeling her hatred rise within. Instantly she reached for her own sabre.It gavean answering _pshhhewwwwww_, as its brilliant crimson blade burst into life, mid air as she leapt high over the flaming pyre...

Whummmm…

She brought the red blade down fast, aimed at the shadowy figure's hooded head, but the blinding-bright green blade raised to block it, and the white hot cores of the two sabres met with a crackle of energy. _Xxxxxssssskksssss…_

'Uurgh!' She cried with rage. She tried to sweep the blade under his, but the figure twisted nimbly to intercept her blow. Again she swung, again he parried, and this time pushed her back into the heat of the flames. She steadied herself and rocked forward, her sabre flying around towards him in a burning ark, but he jumped back out of its path.

He laughed at her, mockingly, and jumping back again into a closing mist.

The mist was dense, dark, asphyxiating. As Culdara made pursuit, it seemed to claw at her skin. Shadows moved within it, and shouts echoed in the distance, strangely muffled by the atmosphere, and now and again she heard the hum and saw the lights of the Jedi and Sith weapons, and heard them clash. It was as though she had stumbled into a battle of spectres. And then she felt her foot hit something- a stone step.

The mist cleared a little, enough to see the stairway leading up the side of a brooding, ancient building, shaped like a pyramid, it's upper reaches lost in the gloom. Where the steps met the mist she saw the greenish blue shimmer of the Jedi's lightsabre. Again she heard the mocking laughter.

She ran after him, but the Jedi disappeared up the steps. A new figure blocked her path, but her sabre burned into his chest. Then came another, and another, but each met a similar fate, cut down like wheat at harvest. Then there was another figure still, a woman, but Culdara's blade sent her head flying… ThenCuldara was at the top, at a doorway, beyond which lay darkness. Her heart was beating, her chest heaving after her run up the stone steps to the portal of this ancient sanctuary of darkness and mystery. She wanted to go in, but something held her back… And then a door slid down from the lintel above- its surface a mirror. She stared at her reflection, but instead of seeing herself she saw something that made her cry aloud…

Chapter 6.

'We have them isolated, admiral,' Commander Zaon, the chief security officer reported, from his station on the bridge of the Star Destroyer _Punisher_. 'They are on deck 12, bow section 3, corridor 23 sections 19 and 20.'

'Excellent.' Admiral Tiberg said, coolly. 'Gas them!'

'Aye sir, releasing gas.'

In the sealed corridors the young Lieutenant Ramone, in his grey Imperial Officer's uniform and cap, crouched behind two fallen stormtroopers, using their bodies as a cover, and firing his laser pistol frantically at the numerous pirates trapped with their enemies in corridor section 20.

'Attention intruders,' came a stern voice over the com. 'This is Admiral Tiberg, commanding officer of this vessel. You have done well to get aboard an Imperial Star Destroyer, and I salute your audacity, but your marauding ends where you stand.'

Lieutenant Ramone looked up and saw a swirling white vapour beginning to drift from grills on either side of the corridor ceiling. He knew what it meant- death- hideous death by the fumes of a noxious poison. He would be killed by his own side… at least if he wasn't quick to act. Frantically he ducked behind the bodies of the two troops and began to wrench the helmet from one of them, even as the vapours swirled down and the laserbolts continued to fly. Just in time to save his lungs, he pulled on the helmet, with its built in air filter…

'That should have solved that little problem. Commander Zaon, be so good as to take two more companies of stormtroopers down to bow section three of Deck 12. Surround those two corridors, and signal me when you are in place.'

……

Culdara sat up and clutched the side of her cabin bed. She switched on a sidelight and brought her other hand up before her. Her mind flooded with relief as it dawned on her that she was back in reality, and that that place- and that thing- had only been a dream. Then the automatic cabin door opened.

One of the stormtroopers cocked his head. 'Is everything alright in here ma'am?'

'Yes, fine, thank you.'

'Begging your pardon; I thought I heard you cry.'

'No, it was nothing.' Culdara shook her head, raising her hand. 'Don't worry.'

'As you wish, my lady. Is there anything I can do for you?'

'No, all's well. As you were.'

The trooper saluted. The door closed.

Culdara tried to shake from her mind the nightmare- the vision- the severed head of the rebel she had killed- the female- but transplanted from Endor to a haunted mirror in some other world, a dark planet choked by an atmosphere that seemed to drip blood. The dead eyes had stared back at her accusingly; the mouth had rasped things she could not understand. Just a nightmare… but should a disciplined Sith Witch like Culdara thought herself to be still suffer broken nights, haunted by the faces of those she has had killed? Culdara shook her head. As an ace interceptor pilot she had fought in several dogfights, and had many kills to her name. It had never trouble her before. It was war, it was something thrilling. But on Endor, she had experienced something rather new- killing someone inches away- looking into their eyes. She had felt very little at the time, it occurred to her. A certain vengeful satisfaction if anything, but now she felt troubled. Perhaps it would pass.

Even so, she felt there must be more to the dream- the nightmare- the vision than that. That dead, yet haunted, hellish world, it has a meaning in all this. The dark side of the force seemed to be trying to tell her something, or perhaps to be trying to lead her somewhere. And then it occurred to her just where.

She looked across the cabin, and saw her folded flight suit, and on a surface top nearby the belt and the satchel she had taken from the first rebel guard she had encountered on Endor- the container into which she had scooped as much as she could of her father's ashes. In ancient times the Sith Lords had ruled an empire, and buried their dead on a sacred planet, called Korriban, somewhere in the Horuset System, if she remembered rightly. Skywalker had honoured Vader, for reasons best known to himself, with a Jedi cremation. Now, though, Culdara thought, she could take her father's ashes to a place that Vader had several times, spoken of, when instructing her in the history of his secret Order. The Valley of the Dark Lords was surely the place in Culdara's vision, where stood the long forgotten tombs and the mortuary temple of her spiritual ancestors. Surely that was the place to scatter Vader's ashes, surely that was where he truly belonged. Perhaps on Korriban, where once a Sith monastery had also stood, the force spirits of the old Sith Lords truly lingered. Perhaps they might appear to her, and help her complete her transition into Sithhood.

Vader had told her something else about Korriban. It was also a place of infamy for there, long ago, the ancient Sith and Jedi had fought a great battle, which had seen the Sith all but wiped out. Perhaps, if the vision was to be taken at face value, Korriban was also where Culdara would finally confront the Jedi who had killed her father and mother. The last living Jedi would be dead. Then not only she, but _all_ the Sith, would finally be avenged.

Chapter 7

Commander Zaon passed down the lines of stormtroopers in the storage hold on bow section 3 of deck 12. Those within range of the entrance to the corridor had their blasters levelled at the door.

'Bridge, I am in position. May I presume the gas has been expelled from the corridors?'

'Affirmative, commander, clean air has been recycled to the whole section.'

Zaon drew his laser pistol. 'Open the doors, if you will.'

The barrier lifted and darkness lay beyond.

'Bridge, where are the lights?' Zaon called into his com, sounding disgruntled.

The operator's voice sounded confused when he eventually answered. 'I don't know, sir; perhaps a circuit failure… attempting to re-route.'

One of the stormtroopers took a torch from his utility belt, and shone it into the gloom of the corridor. The beam fell over a floor strewn with unmoving bodies. 'It looks like everybody's dead in there, Commander.' The only upright figure was a droid, an R2 unit, not one belonging to the ISS Punisher to judge by the peeling black paint on its bodywork, or the grime obscuring its lights. Zaon grunted, impatiently, and beckoned for his troops to follow him into the passageway.

'They certainly look dead to me,' one of the imperial troopers remarked.

'One way to find out' Zaon said, pointing his pistol at one of the prone bodies. Just as he fired the pirate lurched forward, lunging upward with a cutlass, and at the same time raising a blaster and shooting the stormtrooper with the torch. The torch fell to the metal deck with a clang, the stormtrooper fell against the wall. Zaon gasped, staring in horror past the barbaric blade, into the face of the pirate chief behind it, with its artificial eyes and cruel grin, illuminated by the fallen torch. Zaon gasped, 'Ha… ha… ha…'

'Glad you can see the funny side, too, matey!' Captain Audron hissed.

'Ha… ha… how?'

Suddenly all the apparently dead pirates were jumping to their feet, and setting ferociously on the stormtroopers. Audron withdrew his sword and let the dying imperial officer slide off it's blace. Then he rallied his pirates, and led them on, hacking and blasting his way out of the darkness, pausing only to tap the droid on it's domed head.

'Good work there, R2 E35! Now men,attack! Kill the bastards in white!'

The pirates sprang from the corridor, fighting their way through all opposition like fiends bent on escaping perdition. Each pirate knew that they had nowhere to run to, and their only chance of survival meant surging forward. They made gains, pushing the stormtroopers out of the storage chamber, splitting into groups and fighting their way deeper into the bowels of the ship, doggedly overcoming all opposition, no matter how determined.

They advanced on two levels. Eventually they reached to the great cavern within the star destroyer. The corridors opened out half way up the cliff-like side of the great docking bay. Below was a gaping square hole, and the star-speckled infinite blackness of space. Only a magnetic field stopped everyone and everything around on the wide docking bay being sucked down into the void. The docking bay was vast, and around it could be seen multifarious smaller imperial space craft and other modes of conveyance, including several imperial shuttles, a number of out of-service tie fighters, several ATAT and ATST walkers and various cargo transport craft. Even with all these, there was enoughempty space surrounding the square portal to contain several good-sized parade grounds. As a piece of industrial construction it was astonishing.

For Audron and his piratical crew, though, there was little time to stand marvelling. Blaster turrets were positioned overhead, dotting the enormous ceiling, designed to defend the docking bay against uninvited visitors. As soon as the pirates appeared at the balconies overlooking the dock, the turrets turned their way.

_Blam, blam_… Bolts of fire hurtled into the upper balcony, binging it crashing down onto the hold, along with the pirates on it. Stormtroopers down below opened fire, making sure none survived the drop.

Audron, on the lower position, ducked for cover behind some drums, waving his followers back from the strip of corridor that opened out into the docking bay.

'What now, Cap'n? One of them asked. 'We can't get up to those turrets, they'll make mincemeat if we go forward, and we can't stay here.'

'I know, we'll die of boredom!' Audron said. He grappled for his radio communicator. 'Blood Squadron leader, come in… Can you hear me Drakie boy? How are things going out there?'

'Hello Captain!' Drake Orbit's voice crackled back. 'We've got the upper hand hear, I think Commander Krilon and Skull Squadron are struggling against the weight of numbers, was going to go to offer some assistance.'

'Krilon's big and ugly enough to look after himself, and if he aint he's gotMort-Nine! Get yourself and your group to the Star Destroyer, see if you can't get past its defences and take out some of the internal canons protecting the docking bay. Krilon and the others can finish off the Tie Fighters, or keep them away from this here ship until she's ours!'

Drake Orbit and his squadron had fought hard. They lost six gunships in quick succession.However, they took a worse toll on the enemy, and before longmade a final drive to finish off the Tie fighter threat. Eventually there were only nineteen Tie-Fighters remaining, which retreated back to the false haven of their mother ship.

'With me, blood squadron,' Orbit called over his com. 'After them! We're going for the Star Destroyer itself. Gunners, try to keep the Tie Fighters off our backs!'

The tie-fighters were soon benefiting from covering fire from the by turboblaster fire from the Star destroyer. The big guns, were devastating. The pirate fighter's shields could not withstand such blasts, and three of the lead pirate fighters were blown to pieces with by the first volley. Their pilots hardly had time to realize what was hitting them. Drake Orbit himself narrowly evaded the barrage that came his way.

Orbit heard Salaman one of his pilots exclaim an obscenity in Twi'leki,from one of the following ships. 'Dangerous bloody business!' Salaman added for good measure, likewise strugglingto stay clear of the incoming fire, to which they were all very exposed.

'Attention Blood Squadron!' Orbit shouted into his com radio. 'All gunships- form into single file! Follow me! Use those tie fighters for cover!' _This is going to be interesting_, he muttered.

The _Punisher_'s great guns continued to fire, streams of deadly light ripping towards the approaching fighters. The Tie-fighters tried to disperse, to make it more difficult for the oncoming pirates to use them as shields, but the pirates used their own fire to pick off the ties that flew out of the bunch, and herded them ever closer to their pen- the mouth of the Star destroyer's cargo bay.

'What are you waiting for?' Admiral Tiberg growled to his chief gunnery officer, monitoring the situation from the _Punisher's_ bridge. 'Finish them!'

'We can't, sir. Not without hitting out own fighters!'

'Do it!'

The next blast smashed through one of the tie fighters, which vaporised just a kilometre in front of Drake's gunship. Drake's eyes widened, seeing that another blast was coming his way on the tail of the first. He was almost paralysed, this time,by the sight of it.

'Evasive!' Mortink squealed behind him. Drake snapped out of his deadly trance just in time, and wrenched his joystick to the side, lifting the fighter/gunship out of the deadly trajectory.

'What's going on?' Mortink said.

'Madness,' Drake replied, 'they're firing at their own, to get through to us!'

'I have a bad feeling about this!' Mortink muttered into his tentacles.

Orbit ordered the pirate fighters to disperse again and make their own way for the entry port. Eventually the underside of the Star Destroyer filled their view. Dodging more laser shot and turboblaster fire they homed in on its main portal. Drake and Mortink blasted two of the last few Tie-Fighters in the vicinity out of their way. One of them span in flames into the _Punisher_'s hull, smashing a crater into its surface just shy of the docking bay. The other tie fighter took a hit in its wing just as it made it through the portal. It lost control and its pilot failed to bring it about before it smacked into the roof of the docking bay, knocking out one of the gun turrets suspended there in the process. Drake flew in behind, encountering a hail of fire from the other turrets. Both he and Mortink fired back, where they could, blowing out a dozen of the turrets, making the entry all the safer for the pirate fighters coming up behind. Drake looped around just shy of the ceiling, and swept fire down onto the wide deck of the docking bay, sending stormtroopers there running for cover. As he came about though, one of the powerful gun turrets, embeddedabove, targeted his fighter, and a blast caught it in the rear. It must have hit something important...

Drake looked around to see a fireball ripping through the interior of his fighter, incinerating poor Mortink behind him. He only just had time to save himself, pulling the emergency cockpit-canopy release and jumping out as the flames rushed up behind, the blast blowing him away from the doomed fighter. Drake fell sixteen feet to the hard metal deck. His bones crunched with the first impact, and then he bounced another five feet, and rolled along. Drake'sbody was a mixture of crackling pain and fzzy numbness, but he remained conscious. He lookedup just in time to see his burning fighter crashing into a line of ATST walkers, which were soon lost in a fiery explosion which left black clouds of smoke billowing across the wide expanse of deck.

The black, searing smoke saved Drake Orbit, hiding him from the stormtroopers positioned across the docking bay.

…

Culdara did not try to get back to sleep. She drifted through the chamber, abourd the shuttle, and pressed a button on a control board. She had sensed something, faintly, and curiosity had led her over. A panel, not immediately obvious as a doorway slid upwards, with a slight hissing sound, and Culdara stepped backwards in shock at the figure that was revealed behind, first the black boots, the hem of a long black cloak, the black costume, the chest-piece… all the familiar attire and attributes of her father…

Shock, disbelief and hope flashed rapidly through Culdara's mind as he door continued to rise...Impossible- could she be dreaming again…? Or had the pyre on Endor been the dream…? Any minute now she expected to hear Lord Vader's inhalation of air, but it never came. The mask and the helmet were not there, and there was nothing where a head should be. Culdara realised with disappointment that this was nothing but a suit, a spare outfit of her father's stashed in a sort of wardrobe, inset in the wall.

Culdara sighed, affected by this imposing physical reminder of her dead father. There was so much of him here, still- his ashes in a container on the table, his dramatic clothing here, on some sort of mannequin, his blood in Culdara's very veins. She almost trembled as she reached out and touched the black fabric of the cloak. Then she lifted it from the mannequin, and held it to her chest for a moment, and then wrapped herself in it, to find out how it felt.

It was somewhat heavy, but it felt good. It seemed to give her strength and a strange sense of comfort and power. 'Oh father, let me take up your mantle, let me prove myself not unworthy of this!' She pulled it around herself as though loath ever to relinquish it it.

A voice seemed to whisper her name…

_Darth Culdara._

Culdara shuddered, feeling the force of destiny. Yes, when she reached Colle she would have an outfit made suitable for a Sith, perhaps reusing cloth from Vader's suit. She put away the cloak.

A little later she appeared in the cockpit in her flight suit. The stars were still streaking past, but not at the rate they might appear to if the ship were travelling at maximum hyperdrive.

'Morning ma'am.' The strormtroopers said.

'Morning you two, how's the shuttle holding together?'

'Not bad, ma'am,' one answered. 'We should make Colle in five hours, at present speed- unless you wish to go to maximum drive?'

She shook her head. 'Present speed is fine.' The Lambda class Imperial shuttle was capable of interplanetary flights, such as this, but it was not strictly designed for it. Its usual function was ferrying dignitaries and officers between larger ships in the Imperial fleet, or between orbiting star destroyers and planet surfaces. Culdara was slightly frustrated that it was taking so long to reach Colle, but she was hesitant about pushing the Lambda too hard. If its power system gave up the ghost out here in deep space, they would be in some deep trouble.

'Have you two had breakfast?'

'No ma'am, we were awaiting orders.'

'Well, as I have to make some checks out back anyway. Just for once, I'll take your orders, and go and see if there's anything remotely similar in the shuttle's emergency supplies.' Culdara smiled. 'Instant Centaurian coffee and inedible fleet issue delicacies it is then!'

Culdara returned later with the rations. The stormtroopers removed their distinctive helmets again, revealing the dark, good-looking features of Jango Fett, the bounty hunter from the DNA of whom the cloners had first created the stormtrooper legions. These two, of course, were from a later batch of clones, and had the appearance of men in their 20s.

'Thank you ma'am' each twin said.

'Just don't get used to it.' She sat back, chewing on a block of space pastry. 'So you two, were you part of the Endor garrison?'

'I was, so was Trooper25,690-10, who held here as a prisoner with us, but who was killed. Trooper 347,320-12 here was from the fleet reinforcements sent down to trap the rebel commandos.'

'Except it didn't quite work out like that, Trooper 347,320-12 said. 'What about you, ma'am? If I can ask?'

'Me? I'm Group-Captain Culdara, lately an interceptor pilot, and- you may as well know- daughter of the late Darth Vader.'

Their faces registered different feelings as they took in this information, which made sense of some things but posed a few more questions.

'Vader is truly dead, then?' the first stormtrooper asked.

'Yes, yes, as is the Emperor, presumably. But the Empire lives on and your duty has not changed. By the way, what are you designated?'

'Sorry ma'am, I'm Trooper 12,317-59'

'We're sorry about your loss, Captain Culdara. Lord Vader's daughter- really? That's- something.'

'Thank you. And I'm sorry about Trooper27,690-10… is that right?' Culdara remembered her callous order to dump the body out of the shuttle… 'But we couldn't take him with us. We're lucky to have escaped from Endor ourselves.'

'What do you think they will do with him- the rebels?' Trooper 12,317-59 asked.

'They wouldn't feed him to the Ewoks- would they?'

Culdara raised an eyebrow. 'I wouldn't have thought so.'

'They do eat humans sometimes, those things, the others were saying so at the base,' Trooper347,230-12 said.

'Nastier than they look, you were lucky not to run into them, 12,317-59 nodded. 'Some of the scouts at the bunker caught one, once. We cooked it; it tasted worse than a Wampa burger!'

'Useful to know.' Culdara said, with a smiled. 'I'll remember never to order Ewok pie, trooper… By the way, I can see myself struggling to remember your service numbers, haven't you got ordinary names?'

The men looked blank. 'No.'

'In which case, from now on, Trooper12,317-59, I'll call you _Ben_, and Trooper347,320-12 you'll be called _Jerry_! I can tell you apart as long as you don't replace that shoulder guard, Jerry.' She tapped his shoulder, where the white armour plate bore the scorch mark from a deflected blaster shot. 'Lucky that wasn't two inches to the right, by the way, or your arm would be hanging off!'

'Indeed ma'am' the newly-named Jerry said.

….

The second pirate fighter-gunship to make it through the Star Destroyer was piloted by two Twi'leks, Salaman Fortuna and his young sister Asla. Nearly a year previously, Captain Audron's men had been raiding a settlement on Baldo, partly to rescue Krilon, who had been captured by fierce Baldosi pirates/slavers, who had intended to sell him on to a master of gladiators. Audron's company had liberated a number of other slaves, who they foungd in chains at the market. Salaman the Twi'lek had similarly been spared the fate of a slave-warrior in the arena of death; while his beautiful sister Asla had been spared another form of slavery in a Bara Lord's harem. Both had opted to remain with Audron, and had since proved themselves worthy assets to the pirate band.

Salamam dodged fire from the docking bay's internal defences, and blasted away another gun position. He brought his craft about just in time to see Blood Squadron Leader shot down, and Drake Orbit leaping from the burning cockpit. As the other fighter crashed, Salaman fired through the black smoke at the stormtroopers and other imperial troops beyond. Salaman set his own craft down and looked around to his sister. 'Check on Drake, get him to cover. I'll take care of these bastards!'

'Be careful Sal!'

Salaman jumped down to the docking bay deck. His hands drew two blaster pistols from his belt, and at the same time his lekku, the two prehensile tentacles that extended from the back of his hairless head, drew two long daggers from the two scabbards strapped across his body. Since joining the pirates Salaman had gone on the offensive and proved among the fiercest of warriors. 'Careful to leave some for the others!' He said, his head tails rising up and curving forward like like bulls' horns, brandishing the daggers. Then he charged through the smoke towards the enemy.

Asla descended from the fighter and ran over to where Drake lay. She knelt at his side, and he blinked up, gazing at her endearing face, with its large, sweet, deep purple eyes. Her face was immaculately made up as though she were still a dancing girl, and not a pirate in the middle of a raid. The Twi'leks were a mysterious species. Their females were famed for their exotic beauty and seductive grace of movement. The facial features of Twi'lek females were more human than those of their male kin, as were their lissom bodies. They had probably evolved (or had been genetically modified) thus in order to win favour and sympathy in a human-dominated galaxy. Only their characteristic head-tails and their rainbow-range of skin colours, (in Asla's case a light shade of violet), betrayed their exoteric origins.

'Drake, are you alright? Can you move?'

'My left shoulder...'

'It hurts?'

'Yes. But on the bright side it takes away from the pain of my left leg.' He looked across at the smoking wreckage of his fighter, now mangled with a toppled imperial walker.'I'm in a better state than poor Atobink.'

Asla's dainty hands were feeling up Drake's leg, which under other circumstances would have been a much more welcome development. As it is he couldn't suppress a gasp of pain.

'Oh,' she said, 'you broken both your tibia and fibula. I can rig up a splint, but first I need to get you to cover.'

Somehow she managed to get Drake over to herfighter that her brother had just landed. 'I think your shoulder's just dislocated,' she said. 'Hang on…'

He gritted his teeth as she pulled his shoulder back into it's joint. Immediately the pain there began to subside. Then she had another look at his leg. 'Oh dear…'

'What?'

'Your muscles have pulled the tibia bones to overlap, by the feel of it… Oh dear, and I think that's part of your fibula sticking through the flesh.

'Oh dear… Sounds like our dancing days are over for a while.' He forced a smile at her, but he looked faint.

She retrieved something from the craft. 'We should get you to a proper facility, but it could be a while before that's possible. I'll have to improvise…'

'Just find me something to use as a crutch, I'll be ok.'

'Shut up and grit your teeth.'

'What… aaaaaaaugh!'

He looked down to see one of her lekku members wrapped, somewhat snakelike around his leg, just above the knee, and the other wrapped around his ankle. Each was pulling in the opposite direction, with somewhat surprising strength. With her free hands, meanwhile, she was tending to his wound. He couldn't see exactly what she was doing.

Drake's eyes watered in pain, but through his tears he saw a stormtrooper run through the thinning smoke, levelling his blaster at them.

With his good hand, Drake drew his own blaster pistol, just in time to shoot his enemy's weapon out of his hand, and then to shoot him in the chest. Then there cameanother stormtrooper, who opened fire, denting the side of the fighter craft just above Drake's head. 'Oh no you don't!' Drake grunted as he fired again. The stormtrooper fell backwards, hit in the neck.

'Don't give up, do they? And as for you…' he prodded Asla, 'Why are you trying… Ouch..! Trying to pull my bloody leg off? I thought you were my friend!'

'Do be quiet! I have to counteract your muscles to realign your broken bones, before I can get a splint in place.'

Drake grunted, and decided to be a good patient for the moment. He looked through the thinning smoke to see Salaman, fighting aggressively with his back to them, now joined by several other members of the pirate band. The imperial troops had been driven onto the defensive, even though they still had a considerable numerical advantage. A target-rich environment, indeed. Orbit just hoped he had not goaded his Captain into leading an raid of suicidal folly. It had already cost the life of Atobink, and there was much morefighting in store before the fate of the other pirates was decided. Orbit knew they must either obtain a miraculous triumph or face certain death.


	2. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

By now Audron and his men, aboard the Star Destroyer, had found a way down to the docking bay floor. Most of the internal cannons overhead, remotely-controlled by operators on the Star destroyer's bridge, had been knocked out, and several more pirate fighter craft had gained access to the docking bay. Audron met up with Salaman, and they drove the Imperial ship's defenders back.

'I'm missing all the action, Asla, help me to my feet!' Drake grunted as the Twi'lek helped him up, supporting him, and helping him over to the others. On the way they recovered the sword of a fallen comrade for Drake to use as a walking stick. The stormtroopers were making a fighting retreat, using what cover they could on the way, through to an adjoining hangar section. Before the pirates could push on after them, however, another great armoured door descended, leaving a few imperial troops- those who had fought the rearguard action- trapped on the hangar floor with the pirates. The stranded troops obviously decided that they had done their bit for the Empire, for they soon dropped their weapons and put up their hands.

'They're not getting away that bloody easily!' Captain Audron looked at the armoured door. He picked up his com. 'R2 E35, where the blazes have you got to?'

The little droid rolled forward. _Beep badeebee boop!_

'This looks like a job for you, me little shipmate! Get to work on that door!'

The droid moved over to the access panel, but it had hardly made contact with it's inner workings when sparks flew and an explosion blew the droid away from the wall, landing on its back, crackling with electricity and howling.

'Poor R2E35! Looks like the Empire's got wise to that!' Drake said.

'I've got an idea,' said Salaman, sheathing his knives. 'May I, Captain?'

Audron nodded, and the Twi'lek bolted off towards one of the ATST walkers, climbing nimbly up its leg with the aid of his dexterous lekku. A moment later he was inside, and the towering machine jolted into life. It took a thumping step forward.

'Top man!' Drake grinned, then glanced at Asla. 'Where does a Twi'lek like your brother learn to hot-wire an Imperial walker?'

'He's been around the block,' she smiled.

The pirates cleared out of the way as Salaman brought the lumbering metal beast across, and manoeuvred it around to face the door. The powerful blaster canon mounted under the beast's chin (as it was tempting to describe it) took aim at the door, and opened fire. The energy bolts impacted with the armoured surface, the heat scorching the surface and causing a little smoke, but achieving little more.

'It's not working,' Audron muttered, down below, adding a curse.

Asla spoke into his com, 'try shooting the control panel, Sal' She felt the others looking at her, and shrugged with both her shoulders and her head tails. 'It can't hurt!'

The cannon shifted and fired at the control panel, which exploded in flames.

Nothing happened.

'Great idea, Asla!'

'Sorry.' She looked up apologetically. 'Hey, we couldn't get through before! We're no worse off!'

Then, however, the door shot up, revealing behind it another Imperial walker, with two more behind that.

'Oh dear!' Asla said.

The lead ATST instantly opened fire, a moment faster than Salaman's responded. Salaman's walker took a serious hit to its cabin, while the enemy's took only a glancing hit that merely knocked out its right-hand side cannon. One of the other enemy ATSTs fired too; hitting Salaman's walker in it's left leg, causing it to topple sideways, crashing to the floor. The other aimed at its cabin; now lying helplessly on it's side. The cabin exploded in flames. Fortunately for Salaman he had managed to blow the hatch and roll out onto the deck before the flames consumed the crippled vehicle. The pirates scurried for cover behind the wreckage.

Another company of stormtroopers was arrayed behind the three imperial walkers, like an army of white ghosts against the gloom.

Salaman crawled behind the fallen ATST, where the others were crouched, firing intermittently over the collapsed structure of the leg section. 'Whose stupid idea was this anyway?' He said, drawing his guns again. 'Some stupid, hairy-headed human's I'll bet!'

'Um… That would be me. It seemed like a good idea at the time!' Drake said, still shooting. He caught Salaman's eye. 'What?'

'Nothing. I was just wondering… You reckon they might negotiate if I offered them your lekkuless head on a plate?' Salaman smiled grimly, and then turned his guns back on the stormtroopers.

The first ATST was almost on top of the pirates now, and its cannon was poised to rain fire down on them. Salaman growled, and leapt up onto the wreckage of his own ATST. He came under fire from the stormtroopers too, but quickly sprang onto the ATST's leg, grappling his way up, shielded from the enemy. He reached the undercarriage, and hung there from his head-tails, drawing both his blasters and firing at the ATST's cannon from point blank range, where it was connected to the main body of the vehicle. He shielded his face as flames erupted, and then connection gave way and the cannon dropped to the ground. Asla just had time to jump out of its way.

Drake looked up, impressed. 'You brother's a brave bloody sod, Asla. If all Twi'leks were like him, then none of your people would ever have been slaves.'

'That may be very well,' the girl said, feigning peevishness, 'but there's no need for him to drop canons on my head!'

Salaman, meanwhile, had drawn one of his knives and levered off a service hatch, exposing a mass of wiring and circuitry. He drew back aiming to fire, but at that point one of the imperial troops behind spotted him, and took careful aim.

…..

Culdara's shuttle came out of semi-hyper drive as it entered the planetary system in which Colle lay. For some reason she has an uneasy feeling, not at all like she had reached a place of sanctuary.

'Captain, sensors detect a Star Destroyer in the planet's orbit,' the stormtrooper she had named Ben said.

'Take us to it…'

'Ma'am, sensors are also picking up movement round about the ship.'

'That will be the planet's asteroid belt,' Culdara said, remembering how the moon of Colle has exploded, leaving the world encircled in hazardous ring of flying rocks. She thought again.

'Actually, give me the controls, perhaps something is up.' She moved forward, and took the shuttle closer.


	3. Chapter 9

Chapter 9.

The Stormtrooper fired, his blaster bolt whistling up to where the Twi'Lek Salaman hung. Salaman seemed to sense its coming, though, and let go with one of his head-tentacles. His head dropped and the burning bolt of energy whizzed over his skull into the body of the walker, where he had ripped away the armoured hatch. Salaman looked up, his eyes widened; he quickly breathed another Twi'leki expletive, and let go with his remaining Lekku. He dropped away from the ensuing explosion. The walker was critically damaged, for its driver could no longer control its motion. Salaman managed to catch hold of one of the metal legs as he fell, and to swing himself clear. The ATST, meanwhile, lumbered out of control into the wreckage of the other one, lying in front of it, and toppled forward, its face smashing into the docking bay floor.

One down. But still two more Imperial walkers were stomping forward, their blaster cannons spraying the docking bay deck before them with deadly fire, augmented by volleys of blaster-rifle fire from the ranks of Stormtroopers following.

'Don't retreat, go forward!' Audron waved his cutlass at his men, and his blaster at his enemies. 'With me, if you are not cowards! I smell the treasure! It's beautiful!'

He charged, boldly, running right under one of the ATSTs, towards the advancing stormtrooper ranks. He seemed crazed, he seemed possessed. 'Ha haha ha! I'm the Great pirate Audron! You can't stop me! Give me my treasure you ba…'

Their blaster fire tore into him in a single volley, from close range, catching him mid bound, demolishing his middle, and throwing him back, onto to deck- to lie atop the splattering of gore that the same fire had sprayed from his back. Through the searing pain Audron realised that he was a dead man, or would be in a moment. He realised something else besides- something more important…

The stormtroopers advanced unopposed, for most of the pirates were running for cover. They imperial forces parted around the two toppled ATSTs, and marched on, bent on retaking the docking bay. Drake crouched, hidden in the wreckage, unseen by the stormtroopers that surged around. Asla crouched beside him, close enough that they could feel one another's hearts beating. He caught her eye…

'Wait,' he whispered… 'Wait…' The stomping of the imperial troops boots on the deck seemed like drums beating all around them.

'Now!' They both sprang up and crawled over the barrier that the leg of the first fallen ATST had formed. They huddled down again, and their hearts managed one more loud beat, almost beating as one.

Then the thermal detonator, which Drake had planted on the other side of he, toppled walker's leg ignited, and a blast of fire and smoke enveloped the surrounding imperial troopers, unleashing chaos, death and destruction.

Meanwhile another pirate fighter soared through the portal and arched across the internal space of the docking bay. It immediately engaged the lead ATST, which was too slow to return fire, and which was soon reduced to smoking debris. The fighter swung around to engage the other ATST, but it was already in the walker's sights. The ATST shot away the fighter's starboard wing. It was a mortal blow, fatal also for its deliverer. The disabled fighter hurtled forward, smashing into the ATST. Both of the vehicles of war tumbled together into a conflagration. Even more reeking black smoke filled the docking bay.

Drake and Asla, meanwhile, staggered away from the scene of destruction left by the detonator. They stood back to back, firing at everything in an imperial uniform that stumbled out of the smoke.

'Oh!' she said. 'Oh dear.'

Drake knew Asla hated this, he could feel it, and he felt bad for bringing her anywhere near such a dreadful scene. She had courage, he knew, but not cruelty, not coldness, and he knew she was suffering for every enemy the situation forced her to kill.

At the same time, though, Drake could taste triumph; the pirates had regained the initiative. The blast had killed or maimed many of the Imperial reinforcements, and disorientated the rest. They were no-longer capable of coherent resistance, and soon they succumbed.

All of a sudden there seemed to be no more enemy. Drake realised that he was standing in a vast space like a cargo hold, filled with many containers of all sizes. Disregarding the pain in his wounded leg, he lumbered over to one of the lesser containers and shot away it's fastenings with his blaster. He wrenched it open, and fabulous jewels, surely several tonnes of them, dazzled his eyes. And this was just one of hundreds of containers.

'They can't all be like this…'

At that there came the sound of laboured breathing. Salaman and another crewman were carrying Captain Audron through. He was still alive, somehow, but barely. His feet dragged on the deck, leaving smears of blood behind him. He had only moments left.

'Captain!' Asla ran to meet them, but stopped in her tracks, seeing how badly Audron was injured. Her purple eyes shone and sparkled, lovelier than any jewels, as they filled with tears.

'Asla… my dear… don't… fret. Nothing can… save… me now. I... just want to… see… my treasure, ere I… die.'

'It's here.' Drake gestured towards the container filled with precious stones, and all the other containers behind, promising yet richer spoils.

'No,' Audron said, reaching out feebly to touch Asla's cheek. 'It's… here.' Asla put her fingers over her captain's. Audron gasped his last. Salaman laid him down.


End file.
